Song of Kali (Gateway Essentials)

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La novela narra la historia de Robert qué es contratado para The author did a good job with the material provided and gave many of the characters a unique voice. As such, I would be willing to listen to another book Boyett narrated Whispers can still be heard, though, of the "Song of Kali", the condition of humanity dominated by hatred and violence, perfectly embodied, in the mind of the narrator, by the squalor and chaos of Calcutta. That's the fragment of a new poem that Das is supposed to have written within the past couple of years."

It's an urban-fantasy horror novel with some genuinely freaky moments, made all the more freaky by their macabre banality. To become a member of the Kali cult, for instance, one need only bring a corpse to the first meeting. It's irrelevant how you get your corpse. You can kill it, dig it up, steal it, whatever works for you, but it makes for a frightening sequence, fraught with "what ifs?" and "holy shits!". And all of this is offered as a reflection of what humanity truly is, even when most of humanity is gleefully hiding its ugly nature behind a saccharine humanism. I'll take away one star because of Simmon's rather unbalanced portrayal of Hindu culture, which is of course a rich and varied culture with many aspects to it, some of them wonderful and positive, as opposed to the negative aspects highlighted in this novel. Simmons takes the standard literary model and subverts it into a narrative that works precisely because we can see a highly cultured but often weak and often dim 'one-of-us' be out-manouevred and out-classed by a cunning underclass of consummate brutality. It is a novel about crime and criminality as much as it a novel of horror - and the horror is visceral because it is real, the filth, the mortuary, the decay of the human body, the disease, the fear of the dark, of monsters ... and the last chapters will shred you if you know anything of love. There is even a skilled irony as the 'hero' notes the difference between his position and would happen in a movie about his position. This book goes to my favorites list for the simple fact that after a long while, I was completely drawn into the ambiance of a tales setting.Abe, it's all set," I said. "We're leaving next week." I hesitated a moment. "They're paying very well and covering all expenses," I added. No." I blinked in surprise. Abe had traveled widely as a wire-service reporter before he wrote his first novel, but he rarely talked about those days. After he had accepted my Tagore piece, he idly mentioned that he once had spent nine months with Lord Mountbatten in Burma. His stories about his wire-service days were rare but invariably enjoyable. "Was it during the war?" I asked. He's filling in as temporary assistant editor at Harper's," I said. "He wants the Calcutta article in by the October issue." This book could have been adapted to a film in the 80s when the book was written, but I don't know if it stands up well enough to gain a contemporary adaptation

The book could not be written now. The South Asia of that period of hopelessness has been replaced by a vibrant, expansive India (though let us see what the recession brings) and the despair has shifted to a declining West. The book is filled with a vision of the teeming filthy hordes of Calcutta that would be regarded as insulting, almost racist today. In that sense, this book is oddly much closer to the imperial adventure tales of the thuggees of the Raj than it is to our 'modern' world only 25 years on.

urn:lcp:songofkali00simm:lcpdf:6652b94e-6c35-437a-9590-70c9f0ff5fc6 Foldoutcount 0 Identifier songofkali00simm Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t2p56b60c Isbn 0812515927 We're, my expectations high going in? After bloody winning such a prestigious award with your debut book? Just who do you think you are Mr Simmons, that's outrageous. The answer was yes! Ya para el final la novela pareciera que volverá a remontar con una oscura búsqueda de venganza que podría aclarar las dudas y cabos sueltos que hasta ese punto nos han hecho seguir leyendo... pero no, el autor decide finalmente que su protagonista regrese a casa dejándonos con toda la interrogante de qué era lo que se ocultaba tras todo el asunto en torno a Kali. Dan received his Masters in Education from Washington University in St. Louis in 1971. He then worked in elementary education for 18 years—2 years in Missouri, 2 years in Buffalo, New York—one year as a specially trained BOCES "resource teacher" and another as a sixth-grade teacher—and 14 years in Colorado. urn:oclc:875414507 Scandate 20100902002257 Scanner scribe17.sfdowntown.archive.org Scanningcenter sfdowntown Source

Horror is not my normal territory. It isn't my alternate either. As far as genre fiction goes I probably reach for a horror novel as often as I reach for a fantasy novel. But this is Dan Simmons we are talking about. After reading Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, I was intrigued. How poetic could Simmons make horror? How literate? It was built on a swamp," I said, still irritated. I wasn't used to hearing this kind of garbage from Abe. It was like having your reliable old plumber suddenly break into a discourse on astrology. "And we'll be going there during the monsoon season, which isn't the most pleasant time of the year, I guess. But I don't think—" Yeah," said Abe and rotated his cigar again. He took no notice of my little performance. Abe Bronstein expected his former poetry editor to know his Greek. "Well, the only word that could describe Calcutta to me then…or now… was miasma. I can't even hear one word without thinking of the other."Simmons is an author among authors, and if you have never read him this is a good place to start. Song of Kali may not dazzle, but it will pique your interest and get you ready for his more daunting books (of which there are many).

Dan's first published story appeared on Feb. 15, 1982, the day his daughter, Jane Kathryn, was born. He's always attributed that coincidence to "helping in keeping things in perspective when it comes to the relative importance of writing and life." Abe had a point. Not many people had heard of Robert C. Luczak in 1977, despite the fact that Winter Spirits had received half a column of review in the Times. Still, I hoped that what people—especially the few hundred people who counted— had heard was promising. " Harper's thought of me because of that piece I did in Voices last year," I said. "You know, the one on Bengali poetry. You said I spent too much time on Rabindranath Tagore."

But out of the great tragedy that befalls the two of them in Calcutta, there is still hope to be found in the world. As the hero Robert Luczak says in the end, “But there are other voices to be heard. There are other songs to be sung.” This is a masterpiece that might be read as a companion piece to Ligotti - http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24... - and King's The Stand - http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14... . It does offer some small hope in a way that Ligotti does not (I cannot say more without spoiling the tale) and it is much better than The Stand (written around the same period as Simmons' book), if only because it is more 'real', but all three are explorations of the dark side of the condition of humanity from a uniquely American perspective. I'd go so far as to say this is the most frightening book I've read from Simmons. Terrific horror and a must read for any fan of the genre. A perfect gateway into his work. I was even tempted to give this one five stars. But then I remembered The Terror and Hyperion, which are better by some way. But that's how this guy sets the bar. Still 4.5 stars rounded up to five is not to be sniffed at and technically I did give it five. So sue me! Kolkata is a city of contradictions. One side of the road would show magnificent high rises while the other has shanties and hastily put together human habitations. You travel through roads where garbage is piled high and refuse floats through large bodies of water. Turn a bend in the road and you see a tree lined pavement, well cared for houses and apartments and the road will lead you to some of the swankiest shopping malls in town. There is a mix of the old and the new, the beautiful and the repulsive & the eye catching and the forgettable. Kolkata in short thus is a replica of any other large city in the world. Dan Simmons though paints a grim portrait of this town and calls it in so many words a nest of many evils. And this is the point of the book - it is not pure psychological horror nor is it the horror of monsters and demons but it is something different again, a novel of cultural horror of its own time and place with elements of both. I do not recall the phrase Kali Yuga being used but that is what it is about - a deeply conservative sense that the Age of Kali was upon us.